Letter from John Sullivan Dwight to Sophia Willard Dana Ripley
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Letter from John Sullivan Dwight to Sophia Willard Dana Ripley
- Publication date
- 1800
- Collection
- middleburycollege; middlebury-historic-texts; americana
- Language
- english-handwritten
This is a scanned version of the original document in the Abernethy Collection at Middlebury College.
Help us improve our transcriptions! If you see an error, email us at specialcollections@middlebury.edu .
Notes
A formatted, full-text transcription for this object is available here or by selecting TEXT from the download options on this page.
- Addeddate
- 2016-02-09 19:38:28
- Identifier
- aberms-dwightjs-18xx-01-16
- Identifier-ark
- ark:/13960/t27987t85
- Language-statement
- Our collections and catalog records may contain offensive or harmful language and content that may be difficult to view. To learn more, read our statement on language in archival and library catalogs.
- Ocr
- ABBYY FineReader 11.0
- Rights
- For questions or information about duplication, licensing, or copyright status for this item, please contact Special Collections, Middlebury College Library at specialcollections@middlebury.edu
- Scanner
- Internet Archive Python library 0.9.8
- Source
- Abernethy Collection
- Transcriber
- Joseph Watson (ed.)
Todd Sturtevant
- Transcription
Northampton. Saturday night- 11o'clock. Jan. 16th -
My dear friend, The spirit says: Write to Mrs. R.-
write the history of the day to somebody that you would like to run in [and] tell it to, somebody who can enjoy it with you! But is it not odd that your clerical friend, your bounden drudge to the never ceasing craft of sermon = writing, should have time to indite [sic] a letter Saturday night, as if there were no Christian nights in the week for that purpose?- + he too, that luckless J.S.D, who from time immemorial has performed mysterious solitary expiation all that (Saturday) night for a week's truant freedom? [strikethrough] with [—-] [/strikethrough] [strikethrough] from man's [————] + [/strikethrough] snatched away, for'that vast of timeâ, from mortal sight, like Faust. when Mephistopheles claimed him after having let him run full long. But this night I am free; the wherefore will appear duly in the course of this most quaint + pleasant history. I have had a strange day to break the mount- ony of life - one with little event - one of which the story will sound small + not worth the telling, - but more reasonable than an eclipse in the inward calendar - Last night was lengthened out with dreams; among which two long + connected ones remain with some distinctness in my mind (strange, for I never dream anything connected - stranger yet that my head should contain room for such absurdities) - One was a long confab with Lowell Mason, to whom I worked my way through a great crowd in a church at some literary per -
[page break]
formance, as he sat in a sort of professional chair behind the stage - why I saw only [underline]him [/underline] in that crowd God knows - We discussed the musical wants of the community at great length - The other was of meeting Queen Victoria + her prince as common visitors in a boarding house in Boston, where I found myself living, just as I was stepping aboard a steam boat to Port- land. They persuaded me to postpone my journey + pass a sociable evening with them, bringing in some of my friends. It was by [—] + very nonsensi- cal. I woke exhausted [and] heavy - after a sullen silent breakfast prepared to begin upon the sermon - but not till I had read some from Ben Johnson, for I always hang [sic] off from these tasks while my mind seizes any book for an excuse. But finally I did begin - Cheerfully the sunlight fell around my paper - The mountains [and] the valley were robed in purest snow - all the trees with [strikethrough] their [/strikethrough] all their twigs + branches clad with ice glittered gloriously + the beauty of winter met me whenever my eye looked off from the task. The thoughts began to flow, the subject to open before me, stately vista beyond vista, like a boundless magnificent interior of a temple, [and] I, as happy as an artist in full tide of creation, thinking that not twenty = four hours remained till Sunday - when in came the little West Indian
[page break]
girl from the Clarkes'on the hill, bringing me the most beautiful bouquet of green = house flowers I ever saw, together with a pot of English violets of most delicate fragrance - they filled my room with perfume. I sat them in the middle of my table in the golden sunlight, amid a litter of books, authors whom I could not think of reading, to whom fresh flowers should offer incense forever, Shakespeare, Coleridge, Goethe [–] - And now had I most grateful accom - paniments around me in my work - All day I wrote, but in alarm I looked + saw the vast temple nowheres near completed, no, not more than just begun. Sunday meanwhile coming on apace- It was not that my sermon did not grow; but my subject grew so much faster - I had fished up a handy little thought - but [strikethrough] little [/strikethrough] like the casket fished up by the old man in the Ara- bian tale, when I opened it, forth rolled up + up a cloud of smoke, which became a giant of most appalling stature, + made me wish my casket in the sea again - So was I tormented. But faith came to my aid;' The night is indef- initely long - thou canst do impossible things - or at least try - think of Abraham willing to sacrifice his son - did not God send him a ram in- stead? So I worked on - my horizon still flee- ing before me - till I was weary + dizzy - I resolved to run out, just after dark, + breathe
[page break]
[written vertically on right side]
awhile - I run in to chat with some lady friends, seek- ing relief in something the most opposite to my work; they gave it me, in (will you believe it?) a game of whist, which I enjoyed most rarely, feeling as if.. [sic] had got a thousand miles away from the region I had all day occupied - After a brief replenishment in this odd way I hastened home, in faith + yet in terror, to my formidable task. Then was handed me a note, com- mencing with the motto:'Haud ignarus mali miseris succur-
[written vertically on left side]
rere discoâ, telling me how glad I ought to be if a stray brother should offer to preach for me + actually making me that offer, + signed J.F. Clarke, Mansion House - So was my diligence rewarded, my [strikethrough] distress [/strikethrough] despair seen of heaven [and] relieved - + now good night! Yours J.S.D. Will you not write me by Mr Huntington?
[translation of Latin motto: by no means unfamiliar with trouble, I have learned to help the miserable]